MP 7,1 Lacking Sound quality via TB->HDMI Adapter

[goMac]

I respectfully disagree. HDMI communicates by identifying and matching up EDID codes from the sending and receiving device. These EDID codes do not always match up because the HDMI is poorly engineered and as result the implementation of it within various devices can be end up appearing faulty.

In many cases you may be lucky but then again there are cases where it just does not work correctly. I have a SACD player by Sony which also does not work with my processor. Other components do. My Old Mac Pro does not, but my new 7,1 does. I went over that with several tech support people to confirm this general HDMI issue.

In case of an EDID mismatch you can get something like the Gefen HDMI Detective plus which will be able to pair up mismatching EDID information. I did this and the problem went away. Not happy that I had to go such a route but at least I was able to move on.

EDID can sometimes be a problem, but the reason I didn't dig into that is OP is just trying to output stereo. If the receiver thinks it's getting stereo, then it's not an HDMI negotiation issue. If OP was trying to output Dolby Atmos and the receiver wasn't kicking into Atmos mode, then you could dig into HDMI negotiation. But right now there is no sign that it's a negotiation issue.

EDID failure also usually results in no signal at all. If the Mac is supplying a signal that the receiver isn't expecting, decode will fail completely. The receiver getting sound but it just not sounding right probably points at something else, not an encode/decode issue.

 

[flygbuss]

I respectfully disagree. HDMI communicates by identifying and matching up EDID codes from the sending and receiving device. These EDID codes do not always match up because the HDMI is poorly engineered and as result the implementation of it within various devices can be end up appearing faulty.

In many cases you may be lucky but then again there are cases where it just does not work correctly. I have a SACD player by Sony which also does not work with my processor. Other components do. My Old Mac Pro does not, but my new 7,1 does. I went over that with several tech support people to confirm this general HDMI issue.

In case of an EDID mismatch you can get something like the Gefen HDMI Detective plus which will be able to pair up mismatching EDID information. I did this and the problem went away. Not happy that I had to go such a route but at least I was able to move on.

Exactly!
Keep also in mind that HDMI is able to carry various different codecs, lossless and lossy/compressed, so digital is not just digital. If there is a mismatch with the receiver, hiccups can happen.
The fact that the signal seems louder but is lacking frequencies is really odd.

 

[chfilm]

Hmmm Update: So I connected to AVR directly through HDMI to the Mac Pro. It doesn't work at all, doesnt recognize it as a display nor audio output option.
It's very strange, I plugged and unplugged it several times, it's the same cable that works fine with the TB Adapter behind one of the raids, but if I plug it directly into the HDMI port - nothing.

edit: Obviously it's not possible to plug two 5k displays AND a HDMI cable at the same time into the VEGA II. When I disconnected one Display, the HDMI cable started to work, and also the sound is normal now, the subwoofer fired up immediately.

How annnooooooying...

So now I have one 5k display attached to the VEGA II, one to the I/O card, the HDMI cable straight into the VEGA to have normal sound, and the raids also one in the IO card and one in the VEGA II. Seems to work like this, but I have now only only the top ports left and two on the VEGA and I dont understand inhowfar those are still able to carry data or are saturated by this HDMI cable now.

In any case I guess we can conclude that somewhere on the way, probably on the TB3->TB2 adapter the signal got messed up, because the old TB2->HDMI adapter I had before as well, only this adapter was new.

 

[flygbuss]

Hmmm Update: So I connected to AVR directly through HDMI to the Mac Pro. It doesn't work at all, doesnt recognize it as a display nor audio output option.
It's very strange, I plugged and unplugged it several times, it's the same cable that works fine with the TB Adapter behind one of the raids, but if I plug it directly into the HDMI port - nothing.

edit: Obviously it's not possible to plug two 5k displays AND a HDMI cable at the same time into the VEGA II. When I disconnected one Display, the HDMI cable started to work, and also the sound is normal now, the subwoofer fired up immediately.

How annnooooooying...

So now I have one 5k display attached to the VEGA II, one to the I/O card, the HDMI cable straight into the VEGA to have normal sound, and the raids also one in the IO card and one in the VEGA II. Seems to work like this, but I have now only only the top ports left and two on the VEGA and I dont understand inhowfar those are still able to carry data or are saturated by this HDMI cable now.

In any case I guess we can conclude that somewhere on the way, probably on the TB3->TB2 adapter the signal got messed up, because the old TB2->HDMI adapter I had before as well, only this adapter was new.

Why don't you try the cable I posted?